Home On The Strange Forums

[TheFerrett]

The goal of the Open-Source Wish Project is to create perfectly-worded wishes, so that when the genie comes and grants us our wish we can get precisely what we want. The genie, of course, will attempt to interpret the wish in the most malicious way possible, using any loophole to turn our wish into a living hell. The Open-Source Wish Project hopes to use the collective wisdom of all humanity to create wishes with no loopholes whatsoever.

The Open-Source Wish Project was inspired by this comic on Home on the Strange.

This particular wish covers:

This wish’s intent is to bring world peace to everyone. You unselfish bastard.

And this is how what we would tell the genie to get it:

“I wish that there were sufficient resources in the universe so that no one would have to fight to get the things they desired, and that physical conflict would be impossible.”

(This could be two wishes, but I couldn’t figure out a non-loopholable way to phrase a single wish that wouldn’t a) force people to live in horrific circumstances, and b) allow people who had everything to go out and kill people just for the hell of it.)

1) If you think you have found a loophole (or "bug") in the current Wish wording that could backfire significantly, cut-and-copy the precise phrase you have issues with and post your suggested fix thusly:

BUGGED PHRASE:
…the erroneous part of the phrase.

POTENTIAL MISINTERPRETATION:
An explanation of how the phrase could be twisted to serve that genie's evil ends.

SUGGESTED FIX:
…the reworded phrase.

2) If you think the current Wish wording is lacking something that could be disastrous, then post it thusly:

WORDING OMISSION:
…the suggested phrase you think should be in the wish.

POTENTIAL MISINTERPRETATION:
An explanation of how, without this added clause, our wish could come to ruin.

3) If you think the entire Wish wording is so hopelessly botched that you would need to wish for something else entirely to get what you'd actually want, post it this way:

BUGGED WISH WORDING:
Your new wording, rewritten from the ground up

REASON FOR NEW VERSION:
An explanation of why the foundations of the current Wish wording are so frotzed that it'd be better to start over, with a list of why your changes are better.

Periodically, all of the changes will be looked over by the moderators, and the most reasonable of the suggested changes will be incorporated into the official Wish text, at which point this thread will be closed and the new Wish version will be put open for discussion.

There are other Wish wordings for different goals, which you can see here. If you want to suggest a new Wish goal, go here. You may cut-and-copy the wish with attribution to its original source on Home on the Strange.

That said, let's wishulate!

[miles2go]

Bugged Phrase:
“I wish that there were sufficient resources in the universe so that no one would have to fight to get the things they desired, and that physical conflict would be impossible.”

Potential Misinterpretation:
The genie kills every other sentient being in the universe except the wisher. Now all the resources in the universe belong to the wisher and there is no possibility of conflict since as the wisher is the only one still alive.

Suggested Fix:
“I wish that without killing anyone there were sufficient resources in the universe so that no one would have to fight to get the things they desired, and that physical conflict would be impossible.”

[TheFerrett]

[alexmegami]

[genuinechris]

[SorceressKnight]

“I wish that there were sufficient resources in the universe so that no one would have to fight to get the things they desired, and that physical conflict would be impossible.”

BUGGED PHRASE:

"...and that physical conflict would be impossible.”
"there were sufficient resources in the universe"


POTENTIAL MISINTERPRETATION:
1) The genie immediately says: "Okay, then. As of right now, all sentient beings are officially paralyzed and bedridden and get all their foods from a tube."
2) You say there's sufficient resources in the universe...the genie then puts all these sufficient resources in a far-off part of the universe around a billion light years away where there are no lifeforms, and then says "well, getting them is your problem, now isn't it?"

SUGGESTED FIX:

"I wish that there were sufficient resources towards each part of the universe that sustains life in an area that the lifeforms of that area can easily access those resources in such a way that no one would have to fight to get the things they desired, and that because of this, everyone has no reason to fight with anyone else anymore."

[miss_cryptic]

BUGGED PHRASE

[Ronfar]

There are two basic approaches that I can see that could result in "world peace."

1) Removing the underlying causes of conflict.

This may not be possible at a price we'd be willing to accept. Conflicts can occur over resources, but those that occur over ideology tend to be nastier. If the genie makes everyone in the world a believer in, say, Marxism in order to end conflicts over which meme is best, is that okay?

2) Preventing conflicts from resulting in violence.

This may be possible. If people don't kill each other because they can't, and not because they don't want to, then we can have "peace" without messing with people's beliefs. It would require making the world something like an MMORPG with PvP turned off - the set of possible actions a person can take does not include making attacks on other people.

Aw, heck, just make everyone the god of his or her own pocket universe and be done with it. :P
_________________
- Doug

[don'tpanic]

I think I agree that we don't want to remove causes of conflict, if only because conflicts are part of what makes us human. Also, I don't see how you could possibly word this in a safe way. Even if you exclude conflicts over ideas, you've still got problems. I want to be able to argue about who finished off the Oreos. I just don't want people blown up over oil or ideology or landissues.

But "preventing conflicts from resulting in violence" doesn't really work, either. For one, you could still cut off people's water or foodsupply in a perfectly peaceful manner. And I really don't have a problem with conflicts resulting in violence, in principle, as long as all those involved are willing participants. If you want to die for your beliefs, fine. If you want to blow up others who want to die for theirs, fine. Just don't blow up me.

In short, I think the current wording's fundamentally flawed. How about something more like this:

BUGGED WISH WORDING:
"I wish that humans should henceforth be unable to solve conflicts in any way that brings serious or prolonged physical, material or mental harm to other humans not willingly engaged in the resolution of said conflict."

(I know it's full of bugs, but it's a first draft, eh?)

[samldanach]

Bringing the concept of world peace all the way down to the personal level creates some real problems. Looking at don'tpanic's version, what happens if you have a conflict involving two people, and a second conflict involving one of those people and a third person, unrelated to the first conflict.

Let's say Albert and Bill are arguing over whether or not Albert owes Bill some money. Under the wish, they can resolve it however they want, as long as they don't hurt anyone else. Now, the only way that Albert can get the money is to take it from his mother, which would hurt her. Bill really needs the money to marry his sweetheart, who would be hurt if he doesn't get the money today. How would this be resolved? If it can't be resolved, what would happen?

I think the key to world peace is more in restricting the behavior of organizations. I have to admit that I'm lost on the wording, though. I'm not sure there is a way to convince an evil genie to give you world peace in a good way.

[Aliza]

A prohibition on killing people you don't know personally would allow for all the current varieties of human behavior except for large-scale war and associated things like terrorism.

It would still let economic inequities and assorted other evils flourish, but most people who wish for world peace aren't trying to create utopia, just get rid of (what they see as) the worst problems in the current system.

Of course, even if you can't kill strangers, you can still unleash biological weapons that make them sick, blind them with mustard gas, let them starve... so perhaps my idea isn't very useful.

However, I do assert that if every human religion included an absolute prohibition on killing strangers, (except, perhaps, within the boundaries of your own home), the world would be a nicer place. (Yes, I know, religion isn't the be-all and end-all of controlling human behavior, but it's a convenient starting place, even more than the Code of Hammurabi.)

[efbq]

[samldanach]

OK, then how do you word this prohibition? Keep in mind that this must be some effect of the universe, and not simply a rule. People who begin wars are unlikely to follow any law, no matter where it comes from.

Starting point:

"I wish that no human being was capable of taking an action that would result in the death of another human being, unless the killer knows the victim personally."

There are loopholes there. The biggest one being the distance along the chain of events that counts as "resulting." It would be interesting to see a mob boss telling his enforcer to "get to know Mr. X...personally." Given what that threat would mean, would the boss be able to give that order? If he can, then could a programmer create a system for a killer robot? It's not directly killing anyone, but it would certainly result in deaths of people the programmer does not know.

Also, what about unintentional deaths? Would a pilot become incapable of taking off, if the plane was destined to crash? Would that create paradoxes? Should "intentional" be added to the phrasing?

Finally, do we need to define "knows the victim personally" more specifically? I can think of many ways to interpret that very strictly. But, that only means that it's harder to kill people. I can't think of any ways to interpret it that make it easier to kill people.

[PotatoEngineer]

[Kodiak_Claw]

This wish is a bad idea in general. There are soooo many ways it can go wrong. And there's a problem that occurs no matter what you do. Even if you don't create a dictatorship by virtue of the wish, you more or less automatically ensure that any dictatorship which does or will exist can't be brought down. (And lack of being able to kill you won't slow any dictators down, they can still torture you half to death or have your family raped.)

It might be best, that instead of wishing for world peace, you try to eliminate a cause or means of strife. Which is actually pretty difficult, most of these things are caused by people hating each other, or after power, not fighting over a given resource.

Can always wish there was more oil in the world. Though while you're at it, a better wish might be for cheap, clean, renewable energy. (That the politicians will let through)